Twins
The other day I admired the dress Maori was wearing at the Fabric Workshop & Museum fundraiser. She told me it was a brand called GANNI and then sent me a pic of this outfit, correctly assessing it was my vibe, and joking we could get matching sets and galavant around town in these gold getups. I told her we could finally launch our performative podcast duo, Ebony and Ivory.
As it happens, I recently blew a full-price load of money on the Marine Serre catsuit I’d seen Youngmi wearing on Instagram. I sent her a selfie in it and she said we should wear them together when we go out next time.
My son’s preschool class includes a pair of identical twin sisters who always wear matching outfits and I find it so charming.
My mom used to make matching clothes for my sister and me, and I always thought it was endearing that our sizes would forever be modulated—one smaller one bigger—but otherwise identical. My sister is several inches shorter than me as an adult, which reinforces the notion of her littler-ness. I feel we’re always trying to be twins in our peculiar way, too.
I thought of the song Jillian wrote—Twins—in the band we formed with Chelsea. There are actually several versions of Twins, and I love listening to Jillian’s vocal kreening on all the versions. I am improbably playing a guitar on these tracks, with Chelsea on drums, and I think that’s when I realized Chelsea who had never touched a drum stick in her life, was actually the better drummer for this band. I’m not gonna share the tracks, but imagine the voice of God if God were getting a divorce and hired a drunk to represent her in court.
I’d had a funny notion last year that Eugene was a spiritual twin of my other sister. Convinced somehow they shared an exact birth date and time, location.
Dario has a birthday twin in Billie, Meghan and Ian’s kid. They happen to be neighbors, they happen to be comics artists and the two kids love each other. I love this for them, us.
Today, when I went to drop off my son at his preschool, I saw the twin girls approaching the building from the parking lot, coming into focus with their matching tulle skirts and ballet-inspired camisoles, tight blond curls clutching at their faces, fumbling forward, hand-in-hand. When I looked in the other direction at the queue of parents waiting for the door to open, I noticed an Asian woman about my age, wearing glasses and the same flimsy disposable surgical mask across her face and wouldn’t you know it, the. exact. same. faux. shearling. jacket. I was wearing. The peculiarity of the jacket is that it’s a kid’s jacket. I bought the largest size they had because it was so adorable—lined with coral nylon, patched with bright blue pockets. I surely considered myself so clever, getting a kid’s jacket for myself. Here was another Asian mom with a three year old, who’d had the same exact idea during the same LEGO capsule collection season at Target.
I laughed so hard I doubled over. I pointed at her very much in the “same hat!” Spiderman meme.
The instinct to find visible parity is an impulse to find kinship, and the need for us to believe in some kind of divine design. Matching, speaking at once, finishing each other’s thoughts, moving in the same direction, stacking our hands on top of each other in perpetuity in a cheer, to celebrate how brave we are for recognizing each other.
